Transaction coordination in New York.

New York real estate is overseen by the New York Department of State, Division of Licensing Services. Real Property Law Article 12A sets the licensing framework, and the NYS Board of Real Estate publishes guidance on what unlicensed assistants and coordinators can and can't do. Every New York file Quill coordinates is handled with those rules and the state's attorney-led closing model in mind.

New York doesn't have a single statewide contract. In NYC, deals typically run on REBNY (Real Estate Board of New York) forms; elsewhere, seller's and buyer's attorneys use NYSBA templates or brokerage-specific contracts. The seller's attorney drafts the contract, the buyer's attorney negotiates and reviews, and a de facto one-to-two week attorney review period runs before the deal is truly locked down.

Key milestones Quill tracks on every New York file:

• Attorney review period and contract signing
• Property Condition Disclosure delivery and buyer review window
• Title examination and exception review timeline
• Mortgage contingency expiration (if financed)
• Co-op board application or condo waiver deadlines, when applicable
• Walkthrough and closing date scheduling

New York earnest money is held in the seller's attorney escrow account, not a title company and not a broker. Deposits typically run 10% of the purchase price, well above the national 1-3% norm, and the seller's attorney controls release at closing or forfeiture on default. Quill coordinates the deposit, confirms receipt into the attorney's escrow, and tracks any release or credit language in the contract so the number on the closing statement matches what's in escrow.

New York is an attorney-mandatory state. A licensed New York attorney conducts the closing, reviews title, prepares the deed, and handles document execution. Title companies issue the policy, but the attorney drives the examination, the cure decisions, and the closing-table logistics. Closings often happen in the attorney's office rather than at a title company.

Quill works alongside the attorneys on the file. We manage everything around the attorney's work: deadlines, disclosures, lender updates, title ordering, HOA or co-op board coordination, and the closing-day logistics that keep buyer, seller, lender, and both attorneys aligned on the same date.

A few New York specifics cause more avoidable delays than anything else. These are the ones Quill watches for on every file:

• Treating contract signing as the real start. The deal isn't locked in until both attorneys finish review and both parties sign. Counting days from the accepted offer instead of from the fully-executed contract throws every downstream deadline off.
• Sending earnest money to the wrong party. Checks routed to a broker or a title company in New York create delay at best and deposit disputes at worst. The seller's attorney holds the deposit; everything else is a workaround.
• Underestimating co-op board timelines. NYC co-op board packages and interviews can add two to four weeks after contract. A closing date that ignores the board schedule isn't a closing date, it's a guess.
• Missing the Property Condition Disclosure. Sellers owe buyers a comprehensive condition disclosure statement. Skipping or delaying it creates a credit against the seller at closing that wasn't in the deal math.
• Letting the mortgage contingency slide. Attorney-led deals still have a hard loan commitment deadline. If the buyer blows past it without an extension in writing, the seller has termination options the buyer didn't see coming.

From the moment you forward the executed contract until the closing file is complete, we run the deal end-to-end alongside the attorneys. For more on what a TC handles, see what a transaction coordinator does. For context on how attorney-state closings differ from title-state closings, see our attorney state vs. title state closing guide.

• Timeline built from the fully-executed contract and shared with both attorneys, the lender, and title
• Property Condition Disclosure delivered and logged against the buyer's review window
• Earnest money confirmed into the seller's attorney escrow account with written receipt on file
• Title ordering coordinated with the attorney, exceptions tracked through cure or waiver
• Mortgage contingency tracked with a direct lender check-in before the deadline
• Co-op board application and condo waiver timelines managed when applicable, with status checks across building management
• Closing scheduled across both attorneys, lender, and buyer and seller, with the walkthrough built into the calendar
• Post-closing package assembled for the broker file

New York isn't one market, it's several. NYC co-op and condo deals have board approvals, building-specific financials, and closing logistics that don't exist upstate. Long Island and Westchester are suburban closings with NYC-adjacent pricing. Upstate New York runs closer to a conventional attorney-state closing on a longer timeline. Quill adjusts to the market the file is in rather than forcing every deal through the same template.

For more detail on how real estate transactions work here, see our in-depth guides: New York real estate Closing Guide.